Was the European Council a failure? It has to be recognised - the reactions to last week's summit have on the whole been negative. According to the European Parliament and a large number of commentaries, national selfishness probably won the day over the European interest. The explanations and reasons given by the heads of state and government were not convincing. Nonetheless, they achieved their objective - the 2014-2020 financial framework now exists and the European Parliament still has the power to reject it. Each has his responsibilities.
As far as I know, EUROPE remains alone - or nearly alone - in making accessible to its readers not only the disappointment and criticism, but also the explanations of the summit's key players.
The title across the whole of the front page of the most widely read Belgian daily in Brussels (the headquarters of the EU, where the summit took place) is significant: “Austerity has won, Europe has lost”. This is one example of a tone that is indeed not positive for the image of the EU - an image that is currently having a tough ride. It is so easy to criticise it and to attribute the responsibility for national difficulties to it!
When presenting the final compromise of the European summit he had chaired, Herman Van Rompuy invited MEPs to think about the millions of people who are waiting for the support and funding that was decided on - the unemployed, young people, regions in financial difficulty. Was it possible to set a more generous European financial framework? No - it was the maximum possible because unanimity was needed. Yet the reactions were largely negative, and even the legitimacy of the European Council has been called into question.
In search of objectivity. The heads of state and government - elected by the people - have as much democratic legitimacy as the European Parliament, and several of them are faced with national budgetary deficits that imposes economic austerity on them (those who don't like this term have replaced it with another). Gradually reducing national deficits is not a choice - it's a necessity. In the long term, debt costs too much and it limits - indeed even removes - a country's ability to act. This is not a question of political orientation. France is Socialist but determined to radically reduce debt because maintaining it benefits the world of finance to the detriment of citizens and future generations, and maintaining debt also prevents recovery. Saying no to debt reduction means making one's country dependent on creditors and being subjected to astronomical interest that help only speculators and banks. A country that is too much in debt ends up losing its autonomy and even its national character.
Rubbishing the European Council's results out of principle is going too far, unfair and damaging to the image of Europe, when we now have the seven-year financial framework that opens up all sorts of positive perspectives for Community activity and consolidation of the common policies.
Nevertheless, it has to be recognised that the alternative drawn up by the European Parliament - which as we well know has the capacity to reject the summit's conclusions - presents positive and interesting elements. I am not referring to some superficial and forceful accusations that heads of government present as anti-Europe (ask the Polish members of parliament what they think of the programme defined by the summit), but to those who have drawn up an authentic alternative doctrine. The heads of the pro-European political groups (Joseph Daul for the EPP, Hannes Swoboda for the S&D, Guy Verhofstadt for the Liberals and Daniel Cohn-Bendit for the Greens) do not question the legitimacy of the European Council but affirm that the Parliament cannot accept the agreement between heads of government as it currently stands. They believe that “it's now that the true negotiations are beginning”, pointing out their priority objectives - (1) flexibility between years and between the categories of spending; (2) a revision clause, with a qualified majority vote at the Council which would allow the financial framework to be revised in two or three years; (3) setting up true own resources which would gradually replace the national contributions.
This would be the opening of a dialogue - the outcome of which could see the Parliament deliver a positive opinion next month. Yet more radical positions also exist, which support a negative vote next month. Jean-Marie Cavada, an MEP and leader of the Mouvement Européen France, has warned that, by bringing together those who consider that the financial framework defined by the summit is insufficient, those who - on the contrary - find it excessive, and those who are opposed to European construction in itself, the Parliament could end up with an overall negative vote.
And then we would have no financial framework at all any more. (FR/transl.fl)